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2016-09-21

Snoopy, Come Home

Editor’s note : a
big thank you to Paramount Home Media
Distribution for the promotional copy of this Blu-Ray release of this
animated feature classic.

Snoopy, Come Home (Bill Melendez, 1972)

Snoopy travels to see
his sick former owner and then feels obliged to return to her permanently.

From the Peanuts’
creator and writer, Charles M. Schulz,
Snoopy, Come Home is another great
rendition of Schulz’s unique amazing
observations of life. One of the only setbacks is the fact that Vince Guaraldi was not the composer of
the musical score for Snoopy, Come Home.

As many others, I grew up on watching Charlie Brown films and TV movies when they were aired at my local
TV station. So I sure did saw this movie before and it was probably not my
favorite one as a child because it is a sad story where Snoopy has to choose
between his first and second owner. It is a sob fest of goodbyes and the
premature characters of Charlie Brown are talking to the inner child of adults
more than to actual child. However, the dialogue between adults and this movie
is not quite well achieved and the film at 81 minutes might be too long for its
story.

Some things are better in smaller doses and I think that Melendez and Schulz achieved great things with their Charlie Brown specials that are now pop culture classics that runs
at twenty plus minutes. It reminds me how Rowan
Atkinson’s Bean were so much
better in half hour episodes more than his feature films. Back to the Melendez feature it is not a total waste
of your time but it feels like a film that is looking for its niche.

The Blu-Ray copy I got for review is slick and despite the
modest animation, it was 1972, it makes a decent projection on my LED TV. I don’t
think that beyond 1080p Snoopy, Come Home
could look better than this. It could be your definitive copy of this film if
you are like me, a nostalgic of your childhood memories. When my daughter will
grow older, I’ll definitely show this to her but at two years old she just
wouldn’t really connect with it.